


Welcome Home

by elvenjade22



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Established Relationship, F/M, Forgiveness, Older Man/Younger Woman, Songfic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-16
Updated: 2019-05-16
Packaged: 2020-03-06 10:35:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,777
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18849307
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/elvenjade22/pseuds/elvenjade22
Summary: Luke/Rey Modern AU.  Rey's been gone for a while - but after what she's done, will anyone be there to welcome her home?Songfic based on the song "Welcome Home" by Joy Williams.





	Welcome Home

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Mad_Mage](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mad_Mage/gifts).



> Dedicated to Mad_Mage - I've loved all your songfics so much I was inspired to try one of my own!
> 
> Based on the song "Welcome Home" by Joy Williams. It's been a challenging few months, so I needed to write something utterly pure and hopeful, and this song has always felt to me like the perfect example of love in its purest form. Enjoy!

Rey certainly wasn't expecting an entourage, but a few friendly faces would have been nice.

She wheeled her carry-on bag down the ramp toward the luggage carousel, stealing glances at the waiting crowds while simultaneously trying to _look_ as if she wasn't hoping to see anyone. Of course they would be busy. They all had jobs, and lives, and other people.  But she'd called two days ago to let them know she was coming, and she thought at least Leia might have shown up, or maybe…

No. She couldn't expect him to be here, not after what she'd done.

Rey picked up her suitcase and dragged everything to the main entrance. It was snowing, coming down in huge, soggy, miserable clumps that collected in piles of slush on the pavement—standard fare for a Michigan January. She found an empty taxi a few hundred yards down the sidewalk, and after the driver had finished loading her bags into the trunk she slid into the backseat, rubbing at her arms to warm them.

"Where you headed?" the driver asked as he got back in the car.

Rey hesitated. She hadn't really thought this through. Part of her must have assumed that someone would be there to meet her, would offer her a place to stay for the night…

"The, uh, Greenbriar Motel," she said finally. "On Fifth."

It was nothing fancy, that was certain, and the neighborhood had a bit of a reputation for drug dealing. But it was also cheap, and after living off her savings account for so long, her funds were running low.

Twenty minutes later she brushed a wadded-up paper napkin off the bed and sat down on the dingy brown duvet, trying not to think too hard about where that slightly rancid smell might be coming from.

So. This was it, for now at least.

_Welcome home, Rey,_ she thought.

She dug her phone out of her bag, but the battery was dead. She plugged it in to charge, wincing as the outlet popped loudly, and when the screen finally came on there were two notifications waiting for her—a text from Jessika ( _Hey, you back in town yet? Hang out this weekend?)_ and a missed call and voicemail from Leia. She hit play on the voicemail.

_Hi sweetheart, I'm so sorry I won't be able to meet you at the airport today—two emergency surgeries came in at the last minute and I'm the only one on call. Give me a call tonight and let me know you made it back safely!_

Rey listened to the message twice through—it was so good to hear a familiar voice. Over the past few years Leia had become something of a mother/aunt/sister figure to Rey, ever since Rey had begun renting a room in the house across the street from Han and Leia's. It had been Leia who'd introduced her to Luke in the first place.

Her chest tightened at the thought of him. She knew she would have to face him eventually. Apologize. She hoped he would be able to forgive her someday, but even if he did, things would never be the same—she'd ruined any chance of that.

Rey shot a quick text back to Jessika but decided to wait to return Leia's call—she was likely still at the hospital. She opened up her contacts anyway, and, as had happened countless times over the past months, her finger hovered over Luke's name at the top of her favorites list.  She had never once gone through with it, not since the day she'd left. But today...well, there was no point in putting it off any longer.

She took a deep breath and tapped the screen.

For a moment she was afraid (or was it hopeful?) that he wouldn't answer, but after four rings there was a short pause.

"Hello?"

Rey swallowed the urge to burst into tears just hearing his voice again. "Hey," she said finally. "It's me. R—"

"Hello, Rey."

"I didn't know if you'd recognize my voice...it's been a while."

"It has," Luke said. "But your voice isn't something I could easily forget. That, and the name on the caller ID helps."

"Oh." Rey laughed nervously. "Right. There's that."

An uncomfortable silence followed, something that would have been completely foreign to their interactions in the past. Even silence with Luke had felt safe.  Effortless. But everything had changed, and it was all her fault.

Luke was the one to finally break the tension.

"Leia told me you were getting back into town today," he said.

"Yeah, I just got in a couple of hours ago."

"Flight go all right?"

"Mhm."

More silence. _Just get it over with, Rey.  The worst he can say is no._

"Listen," she said, "could we...meet, at some point? I'd like to talk, and I think it would be better to do it face to face."

"Of course," Luke said. "I'll be home all evening if you want to—I mean, if you're comfortable coming here.  Otherwise, we could—"

"That's perfect," said Rey. "See you in an hour?"

"See you then."

 

Forty minutes later Rey sat in the backseat of an Uber, trying to think of what she could _possibly_ say that would even come close to expressing her feelings. Just asking for forgiveness didn't seem like enough, not when she'd ripped the earth out from beneath his feet.  She was grateful (and a little surprised) that Leia didn't hold anything against her—Luke was her brother, after all. She had called shortly after it happened and given Rey a well-deserved earful, but once the air was cleared Leia seemed to understand Rey's reasons better than anyone, even if she didn't agree with her actions.

Rey leaned back against the seat and closed her eyes. She thought back to one of the first dates she and Luke had gone on, when he'd taken her dancing at a live music event in the park downtown. It was an absolute disaster, in the best way possible. Luke had only suggested it in the first place because he thought Rey enjoyed dancing (which she didn't) and Rey had only agreed it was a good idea because she thought Luke enjoyed dancing (which he didn't). When they'd finally realized that neither of them had the slightest idea what they were doing, they were able to stop trying so hard and just enjoy themselves—even when Rey tried to lead and ended up backing straight into a brick-outlined flower bed, sending them both toppling into a patch of begonias. She couldn't remember ever laughing so hard in her life.

They'd spent the car ride home switching between stations on the radio, singing along to the songs they knew and making up words to the ones they didn't.  He'd held her hand as he walked her up to the door of her apartment complex, leaned in and kissed her gently on the cheek…

The car pulled to a stop, and Rey looked out to see Luke's house, warm light pouring out the front windows onto the snow.  She took her time getting out, putting off the inevitable moment as long as possible. She'd been imagining this day for so long, always with a mixture of longing and dread.  One way or another, when this moment was complete she would never be the same again.

She reached the porch and knocked, shivering a little as the wind drove the freezing drizzle under the hood of her coat. A few seconds later the door swung open and Luke appeared, backlit by a cheerful incandescent glow.

"Hi," he said quietly, the barest hint of a smile touching his face.

"Hi," she said in reply.

Another gust of wind whipped around them, and Luke shook his head suddenly as if to clear his thoughts.

"I'm sorry, please come inside," he said, moving back to let her in. "It's awful out there."

The moment she stepped over the threshold the warm air came over her in a rush, dragging with it a tangle of memories. It had been eight months since she'd last set foot in this house.

Eight months, thirteen days, and twenty-one hours, to be exact.

* * *

 

They had spent a quiet evening in that night, which had been fine with Rey—it was a Friday, and her work week had been even more taxing than usual. It was difficult enough being the only female in the engineering department at Unkar Industrial without her supervisor, Mr. Plutt, going out of his way to make sure she knew she had only been hired in the first place to meet the "company diversity" requirement. Because clearly graduating top of her class and receiving glowing reports from both of her internships meant nothing so long as she had the audacity to be a woman.

Luke had always been able to sense when she'd had a rough week, and seemed to know exactly what she needed to relax at the end of it. That night had been no different—he'd fixed an exquisite smoked salmon dinner (fish was the only thing he could ever manage to cook properly, but he had that down to an art) then had taken her out for a walk in a nearby park. There was a chill in the early spring air by the time they returned, so he had lit the fireplace and they'd curled up on the couch with a blanket and mugs of tea.

He had seemed nervous, more fidgety than usual, but she didn't think much of it at the time. It wasn't until he took the empty mug from her hands, set it aside, and kneeled down in front of her that it all started to make sense.

"There's something I'd like to ask you," he'd said quietly, and for a moment she thought her heart had stopped.

She hadn't seen it coming. Maybe if she'd been more prepared, had had time to process and discuss it with him, she wouldn't have reacted the way she did.  But hitting her out of the blue like that, the walls had seemed to close in around her, the air thick and suffocating. She'd had a sudden vision of herself standing in a kitchen wearing a 1950s-style dress complete with apron, screaming children latched onto her legs while clouds of smoke billowed from the stove. She wasn't ready for that, wasn't ready to be _trapped_ like that. There was still so much she hadn't seen, so many things she still wanted to do, and she could feel her freedom collapsing in around her with the walls…

She had stopped him before he could even pull the ring from his pocket.  She stood up and stumbled backward, stuttered apologies falling out of her mouth as she grabbed her things and made for the door. She couldn't breathe. The walls, the smoke, the look on Luke's face were all sucking the air from her lungs and she couldn't stay there another second—

She was gone by Monday afternoon.  She had turned off her phone after Luke had called for the fifth time, and first thing Monday morning she'd cashed out her savings account with all of her inheritance from her grandfather, paid up the lease on her apartment, put everything she owned into storage and caught the first bus out of town. She hadn't even paid attention to where it was going.  And no matter where she went or what she did, for the next eight months she hadn't been able to get Luke's pained expression out of her head.

* * *

 

Now, standing here beside him again, she could almost believe that it had all been a dream—that she had never left, and things were just as they had always been.  But the uncomfortable silence and the careful distance Luke kept between them spoke otherwise.

He led her into the living room, and they sat down in two chairs facing each other—Rey noted that they both avoided the couch that had been their usual seating choice when they were together. She cleared her throat, unable to bear the silence any longer.

"Luke, I—" she began, "I—I don't even know where to start."

He waited quietly, watching her with a serious expression as she searched for the words to explain.

"I'm so sorry," she said. "I know how much I must have hurt you, and I've hated myself for it ever since. I'm not going to give you excuses, but I...I panicked. I started thinking of all the dreams I used to have, of traveling the world and having complete freedom to do anything and everything I wanted to...and I just felt all of that slipping away. I was only 25, and I couldn't help feeling that I hadn't _lived_ yet, and that if we got married I would never have the chance to do those things.  I know it doesn't make any sense—I can see that now. But at the time…"

Luke nodded slowly, looking down at his hands.

"I was 23 when I married Mara," he said. "She was 21. Neither of us was ready for it.  I often wonder if that was why things didn't last between us—we hadn't taken the time to find out who were were on our own before we tried to start a life together."

He leaned forward, resting his hands on his knees.

"I shouldn't have sprung the proposal on you the way I did.  Things were going well, and I already knew exactly what I wanted out of the rest of my life. I didn't stop to think that you might not have that figured out yet.  I should have discussed it with you first."

"This wasn't your fault, Luke," said Rey. "Just because you surprised me didn't give me the right to react the way I did. I never meant to hurt you. I just...felt like I was missing out on something, something I had to find. The sad thing is I didn't even know what I was looking for."

"Did you find it?"

"No," she said.  "That's why I came back. I think I know now what I was missing, and I really wasn't missing it at all—I just couldn't see what was right in front of my face."

She turned toward the fireplace, afraid to look at Luke's expression.

"I don't expect you to take me back, I really don't," she went on. "I just wanted you to know that it wasn't anything you did or said, and that it kills me when I think about how much I hurt you, and that I'll always...I'll always love you whether you can forgive me or not—"

Rey hesitated as she heard the floor creak, and Luke's hand entered her vision, blocking her view of the flames. She looked up, eyes blurred with tears, and the smile she saw on his face put the light of the fireplace to shame.

"You're already forgiven, Rey."

He moved his hand closer to hers, and she reached out and took it, hardly daring to believe what was happening. Luke pulled her up and into his arms, crushing her in the hug she'd been craving for months. And in that moment of warmth and silence she heard it like a whisper, the truth she'd thought was missing but that had been there all along.

 

_You belong. You are loved. You are wanted._

_You're not alone._

 

Ten minutes later they sat curled up together on the couch, Rey's legs stretched out across Luke's lap. She leaned into his shoulder, the fabric of his sweater soft against her cheek.

"I've missed this," she said, snuggling in closer.

He buried a gentle kiss in her hair.

"I've missed _you_ ," he said.

She hummed in agreement. "I won't lie to you, Luke—the idea of marriage still scares me. I _do_ want to marry you...just maybe not, you know, _tomorrow_."

"I understand. I think it will be good for both of us to take it a little more slowly this time." He laughed. "And besides, Leia would kill me if I only gave her a day's notice.  You know she's going to want to plan the whole thing for us, right?"

Rey smiled. "And I wouldn't have it any other way. I've missed her, too."

"Have you talked to her since you've been back?"

"Not yet. You're the only one I've seen so far."

"Well, then," said Luke, "let me be the first to say it—"

He reached up and stroked his thumb across her cheek.

" _Welcome home._ "

  
  



End file.
